Kevin Rudd at the Oxford Union: ‘I’m a fan of this country’OXFORD UNION/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK

Kevin Rudd, the apple-cheeked former prime minister of Australia, is not going gently into that good night. Aged 60 and four years out of office, he has just embarked on a PhD at Oxford and seems exhilarated to be learning again.

“I’m into dreaming spires,” he says languidly when I meet him for a morning coffee. “There’s enough of a romantic in me to enjoy this city and its history.” Outside, drowsy undergraduates are cycling to their first lectures of the day and tourists are already beginning to roam the city’s cobbled streets.

Rudd was prime minister not once but twice. His first stint, as leader of the Labor Party, was in 2007-10; his second was in 2013.